Question

posted by floresdelbosque
2 years ago
.JSON file apparently not working AND recovery key (sync) is wrong??

My husband formatted the computer and saved NO .html file or sqplace or similar profile folder. ONLY saved a .Json file, which doesn´t seem to work....(when I restore it from the bookmarks library: nothing happends). The file is 3,51 KB...I don´t think this is normal, since I have(had?) more than 800 bookmarks...I´ve read all the help articles. I´ve tried this many times, shutting Firefox down and then on again.

I also Synced my bookmarks before formatting, created an account and saved the corresponding recovery key. When I try to retrieve the synced bookmarks it says the key is wrong. Even copy and paste, manually entered, with and without the "-" ...nothing. Still wrong. I DO NOt want a new one, since this would mean losing the synced info... (Btw: only on my sync profile says I´m currently using 3303.02148438K, so my bookmarks should be there, I guess?!)

can this be true!? such bad luck? both ways are not working? Please help me find a solution!

Sync itself is not intended to be a backup service. It is intended to allow devices to be kept in sync. The other device though will effectively be a backup of your bookmarks.

Did you sync to a second device if so maybe you can retrieve bookmarks from that.

Long winded and I have not tried it. Not sure what is used to look at and edit .json files, but they are plain text. I suppose a macro in a word processor could extract all the entries commencing http:// or https:// to create an HTML file. I suppose that could then be made into a file that Firefox will import.

Possibly comparing the .json file you have saved, with a recent .json file in the current Firefox, or an export of one will help you figure out what you have.

It is always a good idea to make regular manual backups of bookmarks, or better still of places.sqlite. (That is the only way to backup History, Firefox itself does not make any backup of History)

Without the key and access to the original email account there is nothing that can be done with the info on the sync server. The server may not be totally reliable sometimes it has performance problems or down time, but if it says the key is wrong you are connecting and apparently using the wrong key.